Bad Boyz, (and Girlz) Watcha Gonna Do… (con’t)

So we wait for the dispatcher to reply to us….on the midnight shift we only have one dispatcher and they handle both fire and police 911 calls….but we listen to traffic on our police radio for our department, the fire department, the country police and the state police. When the “stuff” hits the fan, we all support one another. But there was nothing really happing on the radio. We are also able to switch channels to our dedicated frequency that only our car and the dispatcher use. This frequency band is used for keeping the main channel free and really other officers don’t need to hear about specific individuals and if they do then the dispatcher can alert them. On the main channel, we always state our location before every stop, just in case the cavalry needs to come save us. So we get the code back on the driver of the Jeep. Police talk in “10” codes, but since none of you would understand, she basically said that our Jeep driver has an outstanding warrant for her arrest.

So my partner and I plan our next move….and what we will do to place her into custody. We go up to the car and ask her to get out. This lady is 6foot 4 inches tall, and upwards of 280 lbs. Good thing she was cooperating. We explain to her that she is being detained as a judge has issued a warrant for her arrest. Of course she objects but we tell her we need hold her until we figure out what is going on. So we get the cuffs on her and in the back of the car she goes. She says she has to call her boss or she will lose her job. So I go up to her car and get her phone for her and she tells her boss she will not be into work. Things are going smooth so far. Let me emphasize at this point, that our duty is ONLY to ENFORCE THE LAW. We don’t decide guilt, make the laws, or hand out punishment. That is for the politicians and for the courts. We have been ordered by judge to arrest the person.

So we start investigating to find out why she has a warrant. Apparently a while back she got a traffic ticket and due to that and for whatever reason her license was suspended. Could have been for a number of things, she didn’t pay the fine, the judge ordered her to do something (a number of hours of community service, attend a driving improvement school, talk to teens about the dangers of drunk driving, etc.). It seems that she didn’t follow the judge’s orders so her license was subsequently suspended. But she continued to drive without a valid license, but she might have not known it was suspended. She was then again pulled over, and the officer discovered her license was suspended. Although I am not sure what that officer did, the driver probably caught a number of breaks. With a suspended driver, we have the authority to arrest the driver, ticket them, and impound the vehicle, but like I said everything is officer discretion on what they want to do. So based on this lady continuing to drive and giving her the benefit of the doubt, she didn’t know her license was suspended and it seems that the officer probably gave just gave her a ticket, summons for court and verbal warning to get her license suspension take care of. As we now as we told her all of this, she disclosed to us, that she couldn’t make the original court date and had called the courthouse to reschedule. She claims they never sent her a new date. That now brings us up to the current traffic stop and the reason for the warrant. She most likely didn’t show at the rescheduled court date, and the judge issued a warrant for her arrest and that is what the dispatcher was reading to us. As there is no one else in the car with her and well it’s not safe to just leave it at the side of the road, we allow her to call her mom to come pick up/move the car. So we wait for her mom to come. We could have easily had the car towed and that along with the impound fees would have amounted to several hundred dollars. So we’re not big mean police men.

Oh, before I go on. With the warrant, when one is issued and for “small” things like a suspended license, the driver can pay a bond “a promise/guarantee to show up at the court at a future date”. This lady’s bond was $250. If she had that on her, then we would take the money and issue her a receipt and release her on the spot. At times, officers are willing to follow someone to the bank machine so that they can withdraw the money. Sometimes the warrants have $0 bond and sometimes it is several hundred dollars, all depends on what the judge says. This lady didn’t have the money to pay the bond. Me personally, after seeing and smelling the jailhouse, no amount of money would be too great to keep me out of there. But I would never be place myself in that situation from the get go.

This lady her luck was really bad that night. Usually the jail is so overcrowded they don’t have room for these low risk prisoners so they just tell us to “advise and release” (tell them about the warrant and that they should contact to court to have it taken care of). But unfortunately for her they had room. So it’s off to the jail we go. We pull up to the barbed wire fence and identify ourselves and the electric gate opens. There no weapons allowed, so we have to unarm ourselves by locking up our guns, Taser, pepper spray, knives, and magazines in the trunk of the car before we enter the holding cell area. This part is just like the movies: remote control electronic doors open and close behind you, and then the one in front opens, you walk through. The prisoner is processed, searched, personal effects taken, shoes off, and a nurse/mental health practitioner speaks with them. They are then sent into the holding cell with other prisoners until they are bonded out or a sent to see a judge. We left before they led her away. I thought about what to say to her…”do I say have a good night”…I never imagined saying that some anyone would be so wrong, until I caught myself about to say it the first time after taking a drunk driver to jail? I usually say “good luck”, but I didn’t say anything this particular time. I felt really bad at the hand she was dealt, but she should have been more responsible of taking care of her stuff. So I blame her really.

But it still doesn’t mean you heartless….truly I felt bad of this lady….but she didn’t seem afraid at all. She said this was her first time going to jail, but I truly doubt that. If it was me, I would have been crying and begging not to go…but like I said I wouldn’t be in that position to begin with. It might seem like a misunderstanding between her and the courts on the original suspension, but she should have taken care of it, followed up on it. If I hadn’t heard from the courts after a while, I would have called them. These types of things just don’t disappear and when officers are ordered by the courts to detain someone, well that is what we have to do.